when is the last time America had five years as bad as 2001-2005?

[leftofthedial]

I think it must have been the Great Depression (another artifact of repuke rule).

Certainly in my lifetime (50 years) I've never seen a stretch like this, with virtually every measure of the average American's life in such freefall.

Disregarding the government's lies, more people are out of work or grossly underemployed than I ever remember.

Almost no one I know is still on a normal career track.

50 million with no health care coverage and the costs of care for those who do have insurance making it impossible to actually use the system

more in poverty than anytime since the 50's

The nation so divided along dogmatic political and/or religious lines that families often don't even talk to one another

War. illegal, unjustifiable war.

complete meltdown of our governmental institutions to the point that they are now in effect subsidiaries of multinational corporations

rampant ignorance and delusion on the part of the electorate

no free press

virtually every square inch of the country is now a coprorate landscape

net negative savings--NET NEGATIVE SAVINGS!

environmental disaster looming

rampant, legalized usury

if I weren't about to throw up, I could go on for a solid hour with all the shit that has gone horribly horribly wrong in just 5 years.

[blm]

1. And yet, if you're in the that upper 1%, you made greater profit than

ever - who cares if the middle class is working harder for less or that the poor got poorer.

[leftofthedial]

10. and ridiculously so

extravagantly so

absurdly so

it's time for a revolution

I'm sick of the rich. they are the most selfish tiny slice of the population of the most selfish nation in the history of the earth

it is time for a revolution.

[Bucky]

2. Well, those four years following Lincoln's election

Altho, to be fair, Lincoln was a divider (divided slaveowners from their rightful property, that liberal!)

Also New York City was under military occupation by the enemy from 1776-1783.

Arguably the height of the depression (1931-1933) was a pretty dangerous time--FDR barely saved the US from fascism, as the rising powers of Huey Long on the left and Father Coughlin on the Right suggested

[leftofthedial]

11. FDR ended the worst of it in less than five years

but that was the last stretch even remotely this bad

the divide between the haves and the have nots--bad in America forever, but worse now--has become an unsustainable chasm. this is the stuff of a banana republic.

[villager]

3. The Civil War, I think.

After which, robber baron fangs were permanently stuck in the American juglar...

[leftofthedial]

12. the last half of the 1800's was pretty bad for most Americans,

robber barons swallowed everything within reach of their drooling maw

although there was the westward migration to give ordinary people some purpose in the scheme of things

the start of the great depression was undeniably awful--no social safety net and huge disruption for most of the population, but FDR checked it very quickly with the New Deal.

[RoyGBiv]

16. Actually, not ...

Let me be clear that I am a great admirer of FDR, so this is not a criticism.

The New Deal on which FDR ran for President fixed nothing. It barely made a dent. Part of that was because of opposition he faced to, then, radical ideas such as the TVA, etc., preventing them from being implemented to their full potential, and part was because the problems were so deep seeded in the structure of the American and world economies that no quick fix was actually possible. On the last point, the Great Depression was a global depression. "Fixing it" in one place did not fix it elsewhere, which prevented it from being fixed at home. Furthermore, there were in fact several so-called "New Deals." One of FDR's great strengths was that he was not so beholden to his own ideas that he was unwilling to recognize when those ideas needed modification or complete reversal. He basically tried anything and everything he could and opened up the floor to anyone who had even the slightest hint of an idea to help, which unfortunately is how he ended up being involved with some rather unsavory characters at some points in his tenure.

What FDR did do was put in place a system with the intended effect of preventing what had happened in the late 20's from ever happening again, i.e. banking reform, agricultural reform, the social safety net, expansive educational programs, etc. -- all things Republicans have spent the last 20 years dismantling. Once the world economy had recovered from the economic collapse of the 1920's, during and in the wake of WWII, these measures fueled a renewed vigor to the economy and hastened recovery, but they did not ignite the recovery itself.

[Massacure]

4. Hoover?

[NoPasaran]

5. The last half of the Sixties were no party either

There was a horrible, unjustified war going on back then too. And the number of bodies coming back from that one dwarves the death toll from Iraq.

Riots. Cities burning. Assassination of political and social leaders.

Families divided---ever hear of the Generation Gap?

Yeah, these was a side to the Sixties that was about peace, love and understanding, but there was a darker side to things too.

[leftofthedial]

13. I lived (and came of age and protested) during the 60's

I believe America is more profoundly divided now than it was then, although the divide is more subtle

I do not believe the current polarization can be overcome peacefully

today, laws that came out of that era protect (or at least help to protect) the victims who felt they had to protest violently in the 60's

The "war on terror" is probably killing nearly the same number of people overall as Viet Nam, but certainly fewer of them are American military. Still, it promises to be much more insidious as it is so ill-defined, amorphous, Orwellian and directionless that it could well be a perpetual "war."

the 60's saw abuses, but never the structural, institutional attacks on the constitution and individual civil liberties that we see now.

plus, the economy now is in far worse shape structurally, with a radically greater divide between the haves and the have nots.

I could go on--yours is an apt comparison--but now I have to let my dog drag me around the park.

[against all enemies]

14. Both parties still cared about the country then. This is much worse.

This is the Civil War all over again, except this time the South is winning.

[951-Riverside]

6. The Depression

[bballny]

7. Anyone with a half a brain

would have known that this dynamic duo would fuck up. George has been a fuck up his whole life. Why would anyone think it would change. Resumes count and Bush's was a mess.

[leftofthedial]

18. he is as blatant a loser as anyone whose resume I've ever seen

I wouldn't hire him to clean toilets.

[flyarm]

8. in "MY" lifetime JFK 's death..and vietnam with Johnson/nixon n/t

[leftofthedial]

17. JFK's death was an awful awful time

but not five sustained years of things getting precipitously worse

BY DESIGN!

[flyarm]

19. oh yes it was..JFK died and then the war excellerated..under johnson..

and more and more of my friends were getting sent to nam...and by 69 my boyfriend got sent over..and then my brothers went through draft...for my generation it was years and years and years sustained..then under nixon...each spring we sat in class listening to draft with birthdates of everyone we knew..it was a very prolonged time..

fly

[leftofthedial]

20. I was in the lottery twice

I remember

[flyarm]

22. in first lottery...

my husband got #14

my older brother got 54


my younger brother was in second lottery..he got 326

i still remember the numbers!!

fly

[Greyhound]

31. Another Texan, I might add. n/t

[lumpy]

9. Most likely the 20s % 30s

My folks, living in California, returned to Alaska to homestead off the land (back to their roots). We were lucky. Stock market went tits up, joblessness, breadlines, people scrounging the fields for leftovers, charities were hurting. Many people with mortgages had to sell out cheap or lose their homes. The dollar bought a lot if you had the dollar to spend.

[leftofthedial]

15. My Mom and her folks were Oklahoma farmers

when the Dust Bowl and then the Depression hit.

They went west and made a new life. But their stories of having literally nothing are pretty sobering. Then they turn around and get to fight WWII.

[RockHardCore]

21. Can you footnote your claims?

[leftchick]

28. what is the problem

AmeriKa has not sunk low enough for you yet?

[JitterbugPerfume]

23. in the 1980s

under Reagan

[salin]

24. We weren't hemoraging jobs

blue and white collar, under Reagan. I think this era is much worse.

btw, :hi:

[onenote]

26. actually, in the early 80s unemployment was far higher than now

1979 5.8
1980 7.1
1981 7.6
1982 9.7
1983 9.6
1984 7.5
1985 7.2
1986 7.0
1987 6.2
1988 5.5

[Greyhound]

32. Forget it, they just changed how they count. n/t

[JitterbugPerfume]

29. yes it is worse now

but for me personally the Reagan years were worse



Hi Salin --good to see you

[area51]

25. "when is the last time America had five years as bad as 2001-2005?"

I think that would be the 1st Great Depression, & I believe this is the 2nd Great Depression.

[leftchick]

27. 1929 - 1934?

though the Depression actually lasted until 1941.

[Telly Savalas]

30. 1941-1945

Unless sitting around in a foxhole while artillery blasts are exploding around you is your idea of fun.

[Outer_Limit]

33. Most of America's history has been

extremely bad for a variety of people, this country has never been a utopia. It just that more and more people are becoming aware of how its always been for a large group of people in this country.